By Syed Zarir Hussain, IANS
Duliajan (Assam) : India’s premier exploration firm, Oil India Limited (OIL), has sought additional security at its facilities in Assam after incidents of arson and assault on its workforce by student agitators enforcing a blockade of drilling operations.
“This was quite unprecedented when agitators set ablaze a vehicle and physically assaulted some of our workers. We have asked for more security to prevent such unfortunate incidents,” OIL spokesman Phanindra Dev Choudhury told IANS.
Activists of the All Assam Muttock Yuba Chatra Sanmelan, an influential tribal students’ body in eastern Assam, went on a rampage Thursday damaging about a dozen OIL vehicles and set ablaze another, besides attacking workers at drilling sites.
The incidents took place when the student group was enforcing a 24-hour “oil blockade” agitation demanding Rs.10 billion financial package from OIL for development works for the Muttock community in eastern Assam.
“Betrayal by the OIL authorities for socio-economic development of our community has led to the frustration. We shall further intensify our agitation with another 36-hour blockade on oil installations beginning Sunday morning,” said Mintu Borpatra, general secretary of the student’s body.
OIL authorities said the demand was unreasonable. “We have all along been maintaining our corporate social responsibilities to the maximum and have done lots of community development works in the area. It is unfair to say we have not done anything for the socio-economic development of the state,” Choudhury said.
Thursday’s agitation has brought to a halt crude oil exploration, production and supply operations with Assam accounting for about 80 percent of crude oil supply to the country.
“Frequent strikes and incidents of violence could have a severe impact on the psyche of the workforce, besides production loss,” the OIL official said.
The incidents of violence have triggered panic among workers in Duliajan, the OIL headquarters, about 540 km east of Assam’s main city of Guwahati.
“A number of top engineers and other workers from outside Assam working here are scared after the incidents. There were silent murmurs with some of them even thinking of leaving the state fearing for their lives and if this happens it would be a great loss for the industry,” a senior OIL official said requesting not to be named.
India produces about 30 million tonnes of crude oil annually, with Assam accounting for about five million tonnes of the total – OIL producing about 3.2 million tonnes and the remaining produced by the Oil and Natural Gas Corp in Assam annually.
Assam has over 1.3 billion tonnes of crude oil and 156 billion cubic meters of natural gas reserves of which about an estimated 58 percent of these hydrocarbon reserves are yet to be explored.
The state occupies an important position in the history of oil industry in India and accounts for nearly 50 percent of the country’s on-shore crude oil production.
Assam is home to the world’s oldest operating oil refinery, the Digboi Refinery, established in 1901.